Dominant and Recessive
by Shiggity Shwa
Summary: Sam and Jules during their brief hour off work. Sam's POV. Extended scenes between Don't Ask, Don't Tell Ch2 & Ch3. Sam/Jules. Twoshot.


_A/N: Hey guys. This was originally intended to be the oneshot branching off of the second chapter of DA, DT. But it got to monstrous and I crumbled under it's sumo-like weight on my frail ribcage so I broke down and made it a twoshot. Once again a special thanks to SYuuri who had me sit at my computer and write this until my corneas bled, but was always there with pleasant encouragement. _

Dominant and Recessive

Chapter 1/2

Offensive Gestures

There are posters on the walls of things. Unholy things. Things he shouldn't be subjected to when he's waiting to do a meet and greet with their baby for the first time. Things he vaguely remembers from a creaky seat in the back of high school health class. Things he caught when he was brave enough to look up from the blank pages of his binder. Things that scared him away from girls. But then puberty hit, and growing up on scarce Canadian army bases, he became hot property. The terror of these images somehow became irrelevant. Until now.

That's the baby. He recognizes it without a problem, because it's big, and it's inside, and it doesn't look comfortable. That woman, the mother, she must not be comfortable. His head tilts to the side as he observes the poster like it's abstract art in a museum. But what is—Then there's—And what about—Oh God.

"Trying to figure out where everything goes?" Jules questions from the examination table, every five seconds her shoes rhythmically thunk against the metal pole that's supposed to be a foot rest.

He points to the poster, making sure not to touch the paper. Like he might cause the diagram of the women more pain if his finger creates contact. "This is scary."

It's ironic, the fact that he's done two tours in Afghanistan. The fact that he faces certain danger every time he goes into work. The fact that he stares down a barrel of a sniper rifle and if Sarge utters a certain word, he'll end someone's life. But the thing that scares him is a medical drawing of a full term baby in a uterus. It's just so unnatural.

Jules shrugs nonchalantly, but he knows that she's nervous; every joint in her body is fluid in movement. Her fingers crinkle the tissue paper lining the exam table. "It's a natural thing, Sam" Has she seen these drawings? Any of those birthing specials that Natalie watches on TLC? He's going to need to block that channel with the parental lock. "I mean people have been doing it since the beginning of time."

He retreats from the poster, but there are three more lining each wall of the room. They surround him. They watch him like judge, jury and prosecutor. They mock him. He leans against the table beside her pumping legs. "So harboring the baby is natural, but the weight gain isn't?"

She crosses her arms over her chest. "I thought we agreed not to talk about weight gain?"

He wants to mention that crossing her arms over her breasts thrusts them together, only accentuating them more. But they agreed not to talk about weight gain. When he looks elsewhere in the room, it's just another awkward medical poster in his face. He wonders silently what he did to end up in this place. Well, it's obviously one of the countless times he and Jules had sex. He inadvertently smirks. And now they're going to have a baby which—then it hits him. He's having a baby. He is going to be a father. In less than nine months, there will be a tiny human whose life will literally be placed in his hands and he will be responsible.

His hand clamps down on her knee and her shoes stop bouncing off the table. "We're having a baby."

"Hopefully." Paper crinkles underneath her as she shifts her thighs. "Maybe by the time Monty gets here I'll be dilated." She chuckles to herself and the glances to him. "I told you about Monty right? He's a good doctor but—"

She talks and he only nods staring at the demon baby in the poster across from him. In a few months his baby will be that big, ensconced in Jules' pelvis as she waddles around the SRU. What if she refuses to go on maternity leave? What if he has to deliver the baby? He's had the training but barely remembers any of it; he stared at his blank binder pages during that class.

"Wait a minute; you're not freaking out, are you?"

"No." It's not really a freak out, more like an epiphany. He knew there was a baby. Knew it was inside Jules. Knew last night that it made her eat like he did when he was a teenager. Knew this morning that it made her vomit like it had a vendetta. Knew a few minutes ago that it added four pounds of weight to her chest, which he's still sneaking cautious glances at when she's not looking. He just didn't realize that this baby would eventually need him too.

She crosses her arms again and pale skin piles and bounces. He's starting to see the downside of this weight gain. He's going to have to beg her not to cross her arms in public. "Good, because this is entirely your fault."

His hand remains on her knee, fingers playing a false melody against the stressed denim. "Last time I checked Jules, it takes two people to make a baby."

She pries his hand away by his forefinger. "Last time I checked Sam, only one of us was responsible for wearing protection."

She's got him there. It was solely his responsibility to make sure that they practiced safe sex. When they first dated, Jules was on the pill but after she got shot, that stopped and he became responsible. When they got back together, she was still off of the pill. He didn't mind, it meant that she wasn't seeing anyone seriously during the interlude. So when did they—"When was nine weeks ago?"

"What?"

"It's the middle of September now." He does the math in his head, calendar pages flipping backwards. Four weeks is a month. Eight weeks is two. Two months ago would have been the middle of July. "Nine weeks ago would have been the first week of July."

"Sam." She crosses her arms a third time, her new cleavage jiggles and he wants to pin her arms down to the table. How did she not notice before now? How did he not? "Are you honestly suggesting we should try to recount all the times we had sex in the first week of July? I mean how could we possi—"

"Well, Canada Day."

"Oh, Canada Day, you were so drunk," she laughs, chest heaving. Does he have a coat in the car? There must be a sweater or something in there. It'll be winter soon enough, then it's just turtlenecks. A lot of turtlenecks. Maybe he'll take her shopping. She hates shopping. He hates shopping, but he hates the idea of other men ogling his pregnant girlfriend more. Oh God what if Natalie takes her. He's taking her. They're going tonight. He'll order sweaters express over the internet on his phone in the car on the way back to the SRU.

"I wasn't drunk," he grunts and leans his back against the table. He wasn't drunk, although he can't recall a fair bit of the day. He knows Team One put him through some extensive training before letting him leave Ed's house and he drove like a maniac to Jules' place because it had a better view of the fireworks. He ended up getting there before her and waited on the front stoop. She approached in a slow gait that teasingly swiveled her hips while she carried seven pounds of potato salad as baggage. "Everyone thought I was drunk. The kids started throwing things at me."

"To be fair, Spike started that."

"Spike starts a lot of things." Spike and his baby sister. Worse things have happened. Like when she dated her ballet teacher. He's just worried that she might be seeking the approval he, his parents, and Anna, who is somewhere in the Middle East, don't give to her. Spike's a nice guy and fills the spot. But if that's all Spike is to her, Sam doesn't want to be the one to break it to him.

Jules nudges him, bringing him back to the room full of satanic diagrams and bound cleavage. "So how many times did we—?"

"I don't remember. All I remember is you in that dress." He grins at her and he knows she knows what it means. He loved that dress, any dress, but that dress just did something special. The dress was a deep scarlet that complemented her ivory skin. It caressed her body in all the right places, hung off her hips and stopped just above her knees to show a hint of thighs. He loves her thighs. The material was soft and pliable and he has memories of fireworks illuminating her bedroom when he finally tore it off her. If she wore it now, her chest would rip it apart, if he hadn't already wrecked it.

"You and dresses."

"No, me and you in dresses." He leers at her wolfishly and licks his lips. He contemplates, not for the first time, how much her breasts have actually grown. But the pregnancy poster on the wall stops him; the woman in it is an amalgamation of the Virgin Mary and his Grade 9 health teacher. He clears his throat, staring sideways at the poster and asks, "What about that night we both got drunk at that bar?"

"I don't remember a lot. But the sex was amazing."

"It was amazing, considering how drunk we both were."

"You know why it was so good? Because you were probably too drunk to put on a condom."

He shrugs and pulls a smile that's remorseful in appearance. He's not sorry. He supposes that in a few years he can tell their child that he's solely responsible for their creation. If it weren't for him they wouldn't exist. A sweaty hand rests against his forehead as he leans against the jut in the wall. "Does it really matter now, Jules?"

She runs a cool hand through the back of his hair, "You're hot." He sighs; he still needs to convince Jules to go talk to Sarge sometime today. What looms on him now is the ultrasound. The concern that something might go wrong. What happens if they do the ultrasound and the baby doesn't like him? He doesn't know why, just turns away or gives him the finger, like dear Aunt Natalie. Does it have even have fingers yet? He feels like the worst father ever. "You're not nervous are you?"

"No." He lies and closes his eyes concentrating on Jules' fingers pressing into the overstressed cords in his neck.

"Good because we're supposed to be worried for me."

She's right again. He can't imagine what it must be like. To wake up one morning and suddenly know that she's not alone. She has this huge duty to take care of this thing that's suddenly inside of her and if anything happens, then it's supposedly her fault. He wants her to be healthy. He wants the baby to be healthy. The neurosis and inadequacy stemming from having the General as a father can take a backseat. His arms encircle her and he tries not to think about the fact that most of their public displays of affections happen in doctors' offices or hospitals. He nuzzles his face into the crook of her neck, and kisses the soft skin there. "I'm sorry."

She laughs in disbelief because her tone before was a little sarcastic and runs her fingers down his neck and to the collar of his shirt. Her cheek presses cool against his temple and her voice is sympathetic, "Sam, it's okay to feel—"

The door flings open bouncing off the back wall. The impact shakes a side cabinet and causes a corner of one of the posters to swing loose. It's disabled now. Sam assumed all baby doctors, or the majority of baby doctors were women. Apparently this is not the case because Jules' doctor is emphatically not female. The man is in his mid-thirties and tall, taller than Sam which is slightly intimidating. He's clean shaven with dark hair and tanned skin; he also has more muscles than all the guys on Team One combined. "You two know this is a room for people who are already expecting a baby. Not for those who want to try for one."

"Sorry." Jules removes her relaxing hand from the back of his neck, and physically shifts a seat away. The action stings a bit. He wants to place a hand on her shoulder, her knee, her stomach, something just so that this doctor, who is not wearing a wedding ring, knows that they're together and she and this baby are happily being taken care of.

"Jules," the doctor greets with a flashy grin filled with two rows of perfect great white shark's teeth. This guy is not a doctor, there is no way this guy is a doctor. Where is the real doctor? The older, matronly woman who would beam at Sam with respect for a young couple just starting a family. Sam wonders how many other baby doctors there are in Toronto and how quickly they could find another one. A female one. "Don't tell me you're expecting a little one."

"Yeah." For a brief moment she casts a glance downwards. Her hand rests at the dip in her jeans underneath her belly button and the smile she's wearing is serene. He thinks this is how he'll remember her forever. "This is Sam Braddock, he's the father."

"Yeah, hi." The doctor mumbles without glancing up from his clipboard as he retrieves the rolling stool from the other side of the room. Even perching at top the short seat, he still looms over Jules. He could fight this guy. "What makes you think you're pregnant?"

"Well, I took a pregnancy test on Friday—"

"You can get false positive and—Jules what happened to your face." The doctor leans forward and with adept, monstrous hands grazes the black and blue skin on the side of her face. The swelling has only subsided a bit in three days; most of the damage is contained to her cheek and under her eye. Sam feels his left eye twitch while he watches this 'doctor' manhandle his pregnant girlfriend. He wants to say that they're here for the baby and that Jules is fine because he's made sure she's okay. He wants to punch this 'doctor' right in the face to give him something new to fawn over. But instead he watches as a thumb slide over her cheekbone. He will fight this guy.

"It's fine." She ducks her head free from the doctor's grasp. When she straightens, she's wearing one of her fake smiles. See, he should've decked the guy the minute he strutted into the room.

"How'd that happen?" The doctor wears an expression that he's none too pleased and makes some marks on his clipboard. During the random pen scratches he glances up and directly at Sam, almost menacingly.

"Car accident."

"Explosion."

They respond simultaneously and the ludicrousness of the answers makes them breathe the same airy chuckle.

"Mmm." The doctor seems unimpressed as he makes some final sketches on the clipboard, then crosses his legs and glances back up. "Ben was it? I'm going to need to talk to Jules alone for a few minutes."

"What? Why?" His shoes plant into the linoleum floor at the statement and he stops himself from goading the doctor by adding 'make me'. He's sure the doctor wouldn't hesitate and then an exam room brawl would occur. On the bright side they would automatically have to find another doctor. On the downside, he will probably start a scuffle with anyone that stares at Jules from this point until the day he dies. What's important now is why this guy is trying to separate them when this is obviously supposed to be a dual process. Babies have two parents; he has every right to be there.

"Don't make this any harder than it has to be." Being a well trained SRU officer, he recognizes a threat when one is issued. His eyes narrow as the gears in his mind grind in an attempt to figure out the reasons other than the guy obviously wants Jules. Luckily, Jules also happens to be a well trained SRU officer.

"Oh. Oh no." Jules' eyes grow as she catches the punch line of the joke and her left arm wraps around his. She uses her free hand to point to her bruised face. "Sam didn't do this."

Wait. What? Oh Buddy did not just—

"I'm an SRU officer; I was in the Keele Street explosion on Friday."

"She was inside a car when it happened," Sam adds. The muscles in his arm tense hard as steel. Jules hand rubs soothingly over the back of his forearm and he tries to stitch together the remaining shreds of his decency. Through gritting teeth he continues, "Which would the reason for our answers."

The doctor stares at him for a few seconds and then gives one final glance to Jules. Sam knows he's searching for any indication that she's being forced to lie, a crack in her smile, an eye twitch like the prominent one that's nestled in his own left eye. "Okay."

Sam wants to punch this guy right in the face. There's domestic abuse for you. He's spent the last four years of his life following Jules around making sure she didn't so much as break a nail, let alone suffer any other misfortune. The last thing he would ever do is lay a hand, a finger, a hair on her in any action that didn't contain one hundred percent of his love. But he can't exactly be violent towards the guy accusing him of domestic abuse, so instead he glares like his eyelids have snapped.

"All right. I have a few generic questions about your pregnancy." And just like that, no apology or anything. He thinks at the next appointment, Sam will accuse this doctor of malpractice or something. Just to even the scoreboard.

"Sure," Jules answers for the both of them. He crosses his arms and leans back again. His hands feel the steady push of his chest because he's huffing like he just finished pursuing a subject. Without turning her attention away from the doctor, she grabs his hand and holds it in both of hers. Her delicate fingers trace over the lines worn into his palm; it's an action that's always calmed him.

"Any morning sickness?"

"Yeah, every morning since Friday."

Ever seen The Exorcist? Those priests had it easy.

"Frequent urination?"

"Every few hours."

He wants to keep a log to prove that it's every hour.

"Any backaches, headaches?"

"Backaches every night. I had a really bad headache Saturday night."

What? That's new. Why didn't she tell him? He could have—done nothing and continued acting like a jerk. Never mind.

"Headaches are very common in the first trimester; they should go away with your morning sickness. Any breast tenderness."

"Yeah for the last few weeks."

"Why don't you tell me these things?" He didn't know that either. He's upset because there's a knot in their communication where she constantly knows things he doesn't. Like their relationship's spinal cord has a debilitating disease. He's upset because he knows that they had sex during the last three week and he didn't want it to be uncomfortable for her. Just like after she got shot. He doesn't want her to make concessions for him.

She shrugs, lips pursed and she doesn't want to be talking about the subject anymore. "Why didn't you ask?"

He doesn't want to argue about how illogical it is to ask if her breasts are tender before every sexual encounter while assuming she's in an un-pregnant state. Instead he sighs again and the doctor taps the pen on his lips which hide a ghost of a grin. This is beginning to feel more like couples therapy than a baby check-up. "You don't like it when I ask you questions."

Jules opens her mouth for a rebuttal but before she can the doctor interrupts, never glancing up from his clipboard. "I don't think you should be arguing with her. If I had a woman as amazing as Jules caring my child, I would basically be doing whatever she wanted."

Punching isn't enough for this guy. Sam's going to shoot him. He's literally going to shoot their baby doctor. How many times do they have to come back here? Because if he has this much rage and has know this asshole for all of fifteen minutes, he cannot imagine another seven months of it.

He's ready to jump their doctor when Jules give him a look. It's not a warning; she's not upset or irritated. Her eyebrows are soft and the corners of her lips just slightly tweaked. It's a plea. She's rolling his hand between hers like it's cookie dough and the bruises on her face establish a brand new wave of guilt. Maybe everything is his fault. Friday's accident, the pregnancy. He squeezes her hand reassuringly, letting her know that he won't be feeling the refreshing sensation of the doctor's skin bruising beneath his fists anytime soon. "Are we done here?"

The doctor, completely oblivious to how close his pretty face came to being a Picasso knockoff, is screwing around with a white machine a few feet away. "Only if you don't want to see your baby."

He tenses again because he forgot about the ultrasound. The potential cold shoulder and in utero offensive gestures. What if the baby knows how he acted this weekend? How this blind rage that he's channeling towards this doctor is almost as much as he felt towards Jules and therefore their baby. This baby isn't even big enough to kick, and Sam already feels like he's taking after the General. Already has all that paternal rage buried deep in his genetics ready to escape on the first pressure of responsibility.

This isn't the first time he's been present at an ultrasound. He was the only male present for all of his sisters'. Him standing ramrod straight beside the exam table in the base's only doctor's office. Fidgeting with his shirt because he was worried about his mom. He liked his mom, she was the nice one. It's not like she did much for him when the General stomped around the house ruling it as a dictatorship, but she was the one he got all the hugs and kisses from.

He just remembers the room being really white and bright. The doctor had a big moustache and big thick glasses. His mom lifted him off the ground, sat him on the side of the gurney and showed off the outline of what would one day be Anna. She was a green-gray blob on the retro sci-fi screen. She reminded him of a rotting turnip. His three-year-old self replied with, "Wow."

Then a little more than a year later he held Anna's chubby hand while his mom showed them the outline of Natalie. She took the time to point out all of her noticeable body parts. Natalie's need for undying attention started in the womb. Anna chewed on her other hand and he answered with less enthusiasm, "Great."

Then less than a year after that they were back in for Morgan, whose outline was a carbon copy of Natalie and Anna before her. By then he didn't give a shit. He was tired of that same room. Tired of his dad's sporadic, weeklong returns that always resulted in a new sister that he had to care for. Tired of his mom being stupid enough to expect more from his dad.

He liked Mo the most. She wasn't high strung like Anna, didn't need constant attention like Natalie. Anna would try to teach her tricks; Natalie would try to dress her up, despite being less than a year older. He'd rescue her, scoop her up like a little monkey and take her outside. Taught her how to play with boy's toys, climb trees, played catch with her, took her on walks around the base. At nine-years-old he should've known how many alcoholics there were on the base, and it being early afternoon wouldn't stop them from driving.

"All right Jules, I'm going to need you to pull your shirt up and shimmy your pants down to your hips." Sam knows it's for the ultrasound, but it doesn't stop him from standing guard as she unbuttons her jeans and pulls the stretched material to her hips. Absently, he wonders what underwear she chose for today, which pairs she even has at her place anymore. With little more urgency he wonders if they're a sexy pair. For the sake of his sanity, which he's having a hard time controlling along with his rage and jealousy, he hopes that they're not.

Last night, Jules roused him from a deep sleep with her constant rotations. After she was shot, he made it a learned behavior to wake if she so much as shifted unnaturally beside him because it was common knowledge that if she needed anything, she wouldn't ask. He traced her arms down to her lower back and replaced her violent hands with his, gentle fingers prodding into muscle hard as stone. In the complete darkness of her bedroom, her back to him, she divulged that she was nervous about the ultrasound, that the baby book heralded dozens of defects their baby could have. He kissed her shoulder and kept massaging the relentless muscles in her back. He told her that their baby would be fine, but what the hell did he know? A lot less than her. A hell of a lot less.

The sheet crinkles and rips as she reclines, her face a grinning mess because she can't show anyone how terrified she really is. He knows, he feels it too. Even worse than receiving the middle finger from his firstborn child, would be receiving no sign of life at all. Radio silence. Her fingers mechanically start strumming against the side of the table, a drumbeat in the succession of four blunt fingertips against the metal siding. He slides his fingers on top of the table and holds her hand in his. Whatever happens, they're in this together.

The grin he receives is genuine. He thinks that she saves that smile just for him. He knows he's one of the few people to see it. But then her mouth opens in a wordless yelp and her stomach contracts just like it did from his freezer pea hands last night.

"Sorry. Should've warned that it might be cold." The doctor wipes the remainder of some viscous gel onto Jules' stomach. He smiles, but it appears more cheeky than remorseful. The wand drags over her stomach in exact lines, like a vacuum or a lawnmower, but the screen only shows up muddled static.

"Hmm." The doctor mumbles and presses down a little harder. Jules grips his hand tighter, whether from the anxiety of not being able to immediately see their baby and therefore something is wrong, or because their idiot doctor is digging the wand like a pickaxe into her abdomen. "Jules did you experience any cramps or bleeding after the accident?"

"No." She leans up on her elbows and shakes her head more times than necessary. Then she turns to Sam and reiterates, "I didn't."

At first he wonders why she needs to clarify this too him, but then he recalls how he reacted all weekend. This isn't her fault. Even if something was wrong, it wouldn't be her fault, he wouldn't blame her. Something's up with the machine because the screen looks nothing like the picture she gave him on Friday. He knows, he's studied that picture like Waldo was hidden somewhere in it. "Can you check the machine, or the connection or something? It just looks like the screen isn't working."

The doctor gives him a look. A look that Sam's sure he's wearing too, because they both feel the exact same way about each other, annoyed and threatened. But he bends back and slaps the back of the white machine. The static snowstorm scatters across the monitor with a few random numbers and then it fizzles back to the expected screen with Jules name at the top.

"There we go." The doctor doesn't say anything more, but goes back to probing Jules' stomach. The room is silent, which is actually refreshing because it helps his rage dissipate through his shoes, helps him focus on Jules' clammy hand in his; he hears her shallow breathing just a few feet away. For something that's all his fault, he's glad that she cares so much about it.

"Ah ha," The doctor exclaims and keeps the wand still just below Jules' belly button. "Gotcha."

Sam turns his attention away from her and back to the screen and his heart stops. How did it take the doctor this long to find their baby? It's huge. There's a clear leg, a clear hand with clear fingers. He lets out a sigh because none of them flipping him off. A blinking in the middle that he assumes is the heart. And a huge head. He's positive that it's bigger than it was in the scan from Friday. The black bubble that houses their baby has definitely diminished in size. Where is it going to go in the next seven months? He wonders if the SRU is feeding them something to make a super soldier.

"It's definitely—"

"Bigger." He finishes for Jules who has abandoned her anxiety in place for fear because apparently they've spawned an elephant child. Well, he and his sisters are pretty tall, but no one is over six feet. He wonders about Jules' brothers. He's always just imagined the Callaghan clan as a group of 5'2'' farmers.

"What was the gestation estimation on Friday?" The doctor chuckles and jams some buttons on the machine, first pausing the picture and then apparently taking some dimensions of the baby. Whatever he's doing, Sam doesn't like him being that close to his family. The first concrete father-to-child act that he's going to do for his baby is not let it be brought into the world by this guy.

"Nine weeks." Jules pushes herself into a sitting position, not really paying attention to anything but the screen. He aids her with a hand underneath her warm bicep. The gel on her stomach pools as her muscles crunch. Her shirt sticks in place by the addition of four unholy pounds that he now needs to find an instant solution to.

"I'd say nine to ten is accurate." The doctor makes note of this on a clipboard. "Well it's healthy. No defects. Good, strong heart."

Somehow in three days they've potentially lost another week of preparing for their baby, but all of that is overshadowed by the fact that their baby is healthy. Completely healthy. After the accident, the vomiting, the apparent headaches and backaches, it's healthy. This news almost makes the doctor tolerable. Almost.

"Do you want to know about the sex?"

And there goes the tolerance. What sex? The doctor's attitude has been one that Sam's recognized, one that he himself would have adopted with Jules during his first few months at the SRU if his mom hadn't raised him better. For the first time he realizes that Jules and this guy could actually have a concrete history. Knowing that might be the reason just exacerbates the situation.

"Isn't it a bit early for that?" Jules questions, her voice separated from her presence as she continues to stare at the screen with him. Their baby, their nine or ten-week-old baby.

"Well I can run some tests at this point if you want to know, but they're invasive." The doctor collects a few tissues and reaches his mammoth hand forward to Jules stomach.

Politeness snaps and ricochets in his brain like a stressed rubber band because there's something villainous about this guy's hand, all touchy and grabby. Sam knows that the doctor's touched Jules before. Even if they were only as intimate as Sam is with his sixty-year-old doctor, there's still been some touching, and this guy's enjoyed it. He was probably her doctor after she was shot, after they broke up, he probably caressed her back and—

"Nope." Agile hands and sniper reflexes snatch the tissues from the doctor's hands. That's his job. His job is protecting Jules, and caring for her, and providing her with whatever she wants in the next seven months no matter how insane it is, and convincing her that she looks gorgeous because he can't imagine her looking a different way. And loving her. Just loving her for what she's sacrificing so that they can have a perfect, huge child together.

He rests a warm hand on the small of her back so that she doesn't start at his sudden swipes at her stomach. The muscles are still tense, like wrung, wet towels. He contemplates why she doesn't tell him basic things, things he could help with. Just say, "Sam, I have a backache, could you rub my back?" Or "Sam, my face hurts where I smashed it off the inside of a rig, can you get me some Tylenol?" Instead she hides it, fights it. He knows it's because of her childhood. Her brothers, her alcoholic possibly abusive father, the death of her mother. Maybe if she spoke up about pain, it would just bring more.

The tissues travel tenderly over her navel, collecting every spar bit of gel from the limited expanse of skin. She's sits immobile, still gawking at the screen. Factoring in both of their childhoods, how fucked up they both are from their parents, are they honestly going to do any better? The doctor yammers on about prenatal vitamins, stressing that Jules inhale them. He saw them in her bathroom last night; they made his ears blush, made him content and comfortable.

People like them, with shitty parents and shitty childhoods, they learn to parent by doing the opposite. Jules told him that once after a short, stressful, unnecessary phone call with the General. So step one, be around. Don't just come home for brief sojourns to knock Jules up again. She would never let that happen anyway. He would never let that happen, he loves her too much.

Carefully, he releases her gray shirt from where it's tucked underneath four extra pounds of breasts. They both really should have noticed those. Satellites orbiting the Earth at a low enough rotation will notice those. Did they just pop up between this morning and the waiting room? How is she even wearing her old bras, they have to hurt. He lets the material billow over her unproportioned body.

"Well, that should do it, unless you have other questions." The doctor doesn't wait a second before flicking off the machine, obliterating the memory of their potato-headed baby and stands to leave the room. Jules finally blinks and places a hand on his bicep like she has a head rush. "You can pick up the photo at the front desk."

"I have a question." He stops himself from raising his hand. Growing up on a military base, with military style teaching and then well, joining the military, you learn to respect the chain of dominance. But this guy is not his superior, in fact Sam thinks that he could deliver their baby if he needs to, and by needs to, if this guy is their doctor, then Sam will deliver their baby.

The doctor stops in the threshold of the door and sighs loud enough so they can hear. "I was just wondering when she should think about going on maternity leave."

"Sam." Jules rolls her eyes and shifts her weight so that she's back to her pre-appointment stance, legs hanging freely over the exam table.

"We have a dangerous job. I just want—"

"Actually that's a good question, Jules." He rubs a hand over his square chin and his other hand taps the clipboard against his leg. "Normally I recommend my patients have a powwow with their bosses to agree on a time, but since your job is so risky, you might want to consider taking maternity leave as soon as it's offered." Ha. Finally this guy is good for something. Maybe now they can go talk to Sarge and get this straightened out so that he doesn't have to worry about—

The doctor shrugs and just before leaving the room adds, "But then again, I'm sure they have alternative things you can do while pregnant."

What? What? Is he fucking kidding? What exactly is Jules supposed to do at three months pregnant? Six months? Eight months? Because she'll stay on that long. She'll deliver their baby in the back of a rig in an homage to the nativity scene, and then come back to work a week later with their baby strapped to her chest and ask for the Sierra shot if he let her.

Instead he has to be the overprotective bad guy and worry about things like bombs and lunatics with machine guns and landmines. His calloused hands wash over his face and he groans, "Jules please, promise me if you can't reach your sidearm that it's time for you to take maternity leave."

Her hands fall to the bottom of her shirt, and he expects her to play with the fabric, the hem, something to indicate that she's nervous and that she doesn't want to talk about it. Instead, she straightens the material, pushes herself off of the table, sneakers landing on the stool, and with the added inches, she's just under his height. She wobbles forward, the toes of her shoes on the edge of the step and at first he assumes she's slipped.

But her arms wrap around his neck, her face still managing to snuggle under his chin even with the added height. He holds her in the silent doctor's office for a few minutes, under the gazing, debasing eyes of the pregnancy diagrams. His emotions are synched with hers, a mixture of relief from discovering they've been given a free pass so far. That their baby is fine. Off in the distance he knows that there's trepidation, because they have less time than ever. Less time to figure out where they're going to live, he automatically assumed it would be his house because of the two bedrooms but he forgot about the squatter of a sister that he can't just kick to the curb.

Soft lips press into his cheek and he sighs as she rests her chin on his shoulder. Four pounds of extra weight compress into his chest, but all he smells is her shampoo and it doesn't really matter where they live. It doesn't matter if it's Jules furnace apartment that desperately needs air conditioning. It doesn't matter if it's at his place and Natalie is still there. Babies don't take up that much space for the first few months. She probably wouldn't even notice until the baby started crawling and ate her makeup. Even if Spike was—No, he's not that happy. He has to draw the line somewhere.

"Thank you for being here." She mumbles into his shoulder. He's noticed in the last day that this pregnancy has brought Jules the uncanny talent of being able to fall asleep at the most random times. An ability definitely not appropriate for the SRU.

How's he supposed to answer that? It's refreshing to know that she appreciates him, that she's not going to hold his hand and walk him back into that coffee shop. At the same time, shouldn't she realize by now that he's not going anywhere? She made this appointment in the middle of the day and he made it. It's an action that could potentially out them both and put them into hotter water with Sarge, but he still made it. He did it for her. He did it for the baby. He did it because he wanted to be there. It's like him thanking her for having their baby.

"Don't thank me quite yet." He retracts from the hug, but keeps one of her hands in his. He has to enjoy the contact while he can because in less than an hour they'll be back at work with no smiling or batting eyes or bashful glances. He can't watch her and daydream what she'll look like in two, or three, or four months. What their baby will look like. Brown eyes or blue? Blonde hair or brown.

"Why?" She allows him to lead her out of the room, barely remembering to grab her big brown purse from the chair in the corner.

He doesn't glance back as they walk, he knows that her chest is bouncing with the fast gait and he hasn't quite come to terms with the duality of being enticed by the new additions and overly fearful of other people loving them as much as he does. "Because we're definitely getting a new doctor."

* * *

><p><em>Next Chapter - Sam goes crazier and bookstore antics.<em>


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